In response to not-so-subtle political swipes by President George Bush (while addressing the Israeli Knesset), Barack Obama's communication director Robert Gibbs rejected the conclusion of the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program in 2003:

"Let's not confuse precondition with preparation," said Gibbs of any talks with Iran. "Obviously these meetings would be full of preparation. But we're not going to sit down and engage Iran, unless or until they give up their nuclear weapons program.

emphasis mine.

After several weeks' full immersion in what Obama calls the "silly season" of our politics, it's clarifying to look afresh at the core of Obama's case for himself rather than Clinton. Here's how he put it on April 22 in Evansville, Indiana, after congratulating Clinton on her win in the PA primary:

We can be a party that says there's no problem with taking money from Washington lobbyists - from oil lobbyists and drug lobbyists and insurance lobbyists. We can pretend that they represent real Americans and look the other way when they use their money and influence to stop us from reforming health care or investing in renewable energy for yet another four years.

John McCain has a problem.

Here is what he said in a February, 2003 speech that was quoted in a 2/19/03 Arizona Republic editorial sympathetic to the proposed Iraq invasion:

"Is there any doubt in anybody's mind that if Saddam Hussein thought he could harm the United States that he wouldn't give any terrorist organization some weapon of mass destruction?" McCain asked in a speech last week sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"I don't think he would discriminate."

This was directly contradicted by the available intelligence at the time.

Yesterday, I participate in a forum at my school at the University of Florida and I had a chance to ask Bob Graham a few questions afterwards. First, we had two knowledgeable participants: the former strategist for John Edwards, Joe Trippi, and Matt Bai, a journalist for the New York Times. The conversation centered on the role of the internet in this election cycle. Joe Trippi talked glowingly about the Dean’s revolution and was in awe at the Obama campaign.

I found a FoxNews article today troubling, since it makes a thorough attempt at discrediting the NIE report on Iran's Nuclear Weapons development, quoting an NCRI spokesman:

http://www.state.gov/...
On-the-Record Briefing
Ambassador Cofer Black,
April 30, 2003

..Until the recent war in Iraq, they were allied with the government of Saddam Hussein and received most of their support from this regime. They have assisted the Hussein regime in suppressing opposition within Iraq, and performed internal security for the Iraqi regime. MEK, or as some recently referred to as the People's Mujahedin, has also attacked and killed Americans.

The MEK and its many aliases, including the political NCRI, are designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations.

Though the latest NIE on Iraq was delivered to Congress on April Fools' Day, you'll probably never get to see any part of it. The Bush administration decided that the public has no need to know what intelligence agencies think about the state of a country the US invaded and occupied five years ago.

That's hardly unexpected. A few weeks back when the Pentagon delivered it's latest quarterly happy talk, "Measuring stability and security in Iraq" (PDF), it did so with minimum fanfare. Quarterly reports have to be published by law, NIEs do not. And just to make sure that everybody understands that there's no real need to publish this Iraqi NIE, the administration let it be known that it isn't really an NIE at all.

According to an administration official with knowledge of the intelligence process, this morning's intelligence document isn't itself a National Intelligence Estimate. "It's not a formal report," the official said, "it's more or less an assessment memo, an update to policy makers."

It's no surprise that the White House thinks public debate is best served by a misinformed citizenry. What's a little more remarkable, though, is that the WH has now sent out officials to describe the Iraqi NIE's contents to reporters - an NIE it insists on keeping secret. The NYT provides us with an official version of those contents. Treat it all with due skepticism.

A new National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq cites significant security improvements and progress toward healing sectarian political rifts, but concludes that security remains fragile and terrorist groups remain capable of initiating large attacks, several American government officials said this week.

The classified document provides a more upbeat analysis of conditions in Iraq than the last major assessment by United States spy agencies, last summer. It was completed this week, just days before the top American commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, is due in Washington to give lawmakers a progress report on the military strategy in Iraq.

While the last assessment painted a grim picture of an Iraqi government paralyzed by sectarian strife, the new intelligence estimate cites slow but steady progress by Iraqi politicians on forging alliances between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq, said the government officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the document is classified.

Actually, the previous NIE from August 2007 was remarkably upbeat as well, citing slow but steady progress:

"There have been measurable but uneven improvements in Iraq's security situation since our last NIE on Iraq in January 2007."

If the anonymous government officials' assessment of the latest NIE is accurate, and that's a big if, then like the last estimate it accentuates the positive. In any case, it probably reveals little about Iraq that the public doesn't already know from news reports (again, much like the August 2007 NIE).

Several lawmakers familiar with its conclusions declined to provide specifics but said it contained little information beyond public accounts of recent events in Iraq. "The stuff that was positive, they emphasized. The negative, they stated, but deemphasized," said Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.)...

"I was discouraged" by the assessment, Biden said. "I was discouraged by the last one, too."

This is what the WH wants the public to believe about an NIE it can't read:

"The N.I.E. update confirmed that the surge strategy the president announced in January of last year is working," said one senior administration official. "There’s more work to be done, but progress has obviously been made."

That ever elusive "progress in Iraq" the WH has been talking about since June 2003. We know it was making stuff up about progress in 2003, again in 2004, also in 2005, and in 2006, as well as in 2007. But how credible is the Bush administration in 2008?

By a remarkable coincidence, just yesterday the NYT published an account of Nouri al-Maliki's "planning" for last week's disastrous assault on Basra, an account based on named and unnamed American officials. The point of the exercise was to convey the idea that the Bush administration had virtually no idea what Maliki was going to do until two days in advance - and then only because Maliki invited General David Petraeus to a parlay on March 22 and told him his plans.

In short, by the administration's own account it can't be held accountable for last week's failure because it was caught almost completely unawares regarding the biggest Iraqi military operation since 2003. One way or another, the Bush administration's record of perspicacity in regards to Iraq is abysmal.

That's approximately how much we can trust the latest, secret NIE on Iraq.

Dot #1: NIE
She didn't read it. That bothers me.

Dot #2: Katrina
"Brownie, you're doin' a heck of a job." Anyone who turned on the tv could see that he wasn't.
Bush didn't see it. That bothered me.

Dot #3: Reverend Wright
She said you don't choose your relatives, but you do choose your church and advocated leaving the church if the pastor says something controversial. Her husband has done "controversial" things with other women for decades, and she helped silence the women rather than choose to leave the husband. I don't see see that as consistent with the church choice.
Keeping her marriage together.
That impressed me.
Selling out her wedding vows for the expediency of political damage control.
That disappointed me.

A couple more dots, and the connections, after the fold.

Judgment is the ability to make right decisions based on incomplete or conflicting data. More than experience, education or good humor, this is what we need in a world leader.

We are in the current mess because of a President who has a contempt for facts. He would rather go with his guts, or that wobbly feeling he gets in his knees when he looks into the eyes of his good buddy Putin. You would think that Senator Clinton, who can reel off policy positions and twelve point plans is just the anti-dote.

But she has her own challenges with factual reality. She simply ignores inconvenient facts. Or makes up a reality that suits her ambition. This is also dangerous in a political leader.

To me this whole argument over the NIE is a perfect encapsulation of the differences between the two candidates.  What I find amusing is that the same people who are criticizing Senator Clinton for not reading the NIE are perfectly willing to accept that Senator Obama made his decision without reading the NIE, or receiving any briefing.  If Senator Obama didn't have to read the NIE to validate his judgment, then why is it that Senator Clinton is a traitor and murderer, according to comments on various blogs, for not reading the NIE?  (h/t to Eriposte for an excellent discussion of that very issue here)

Finally!!!!  Obama has finally gotten around to pointing out the most glaring piece of evidence against Clinton being ready to lead.

Many of us here were the first ones in line to disapprove of President Bush's policies and way of governing the country.  We were the original 24%ers - 24% disapprove.  At the end of his two terms (two!?), one of the worst things he's done, if we can qualify it, is lead us into a stupid war with no plan or reasoning.

Another diary which touted Senator Clinton's performance tonight at the debate tonight set me to seriously thinking.

I've posted a previous diary regarding why I do not support Senator Clinton's candidacy.  I'd be willing to admit that my reasoning on the particular issue I raised in that diary is extremely personal.

Maybe even petty.  It's a 'gut' kind of issue.  Cookie baking.

More beneath the fold

Yesterday, in a segment on Fox News, John Bolton insinuated Iran wants a Democrat to win the White House in 2008 they can pursue their nuclear weapons program (the program their own NIE concluded doesn't exist):

Well, I don’t think it’s discussed sufficiently. But I think in part what the mullahs in Tehran are thinking about, looking at the odds of who might win, or at least what the conventional wisdom is about the Democratic nominee winning. I think they’re going try and string this thing out in hopes that they’ll find some more pliable administration in the White House.

I happen to agree with Bolton that Iran doesn't want another version of Bush to win the Presidency in November, and with good reason.  

(Cross-posted at VetVoice.com)

I’m sure we all remember when the admistration got this egg on their face:

A new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) released today concludes with "high confidence" that "in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program." From the report’s findings:

We assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007, but we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.
We continue to assess with moderate-to-high confidence that Iran does not currently have a nuclear weapon.
Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005

The troublesome professional intelligence community is getting in the way of a good story.  You remember that pesky National Intelligence Estimate (pdf) released late last year, don't you?  You know, the one that said:

We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program

Well the judgments of the intelligence community have nothing on George W. Bush's gut feeling about things.

Newsweek has the story.

In a story headlined  "CIA: We said back in 1974 that Israel had nuclear weapons," the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on a 1974 Special National Intelligence Assesment, "Prospects for further proliferation of nuclear weapons," declassified in the week of Pres. Bush's trip to the Middle East, and barely one month after the public mention of a National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear programs.

Before getting to the contents of the SNIE below, it is important to understand the significance of this document.  A National Intelligence Estimate, or a Special NIE, represents the collective views not merely of the CIA, but of the entire intelligence community.  It is the executive branch's "party line" on the intelligence question being discussed, and it often (but not always, as we all now know) is the product of considerable discussion and debate.

Great to see everyone on Kos today after that exciting election! The sense of unity among supporters of Hillary, Obama, Edwards and Gravel is so thick you could cut it with bad breath...

The new one is a post I did over at 236.com about possible explanations for Obama's poll / vote gap. I will now quote myself. You can read the whole post here, but reading isn't popular so here's my favorite few paragraphs...

Another possible explanation is the difference between the voting process in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Voting for a Democratic candidate in the Iowa primaries is done in a caucus--ironically, a process that has a lot in common with the way Republican politicians like their religion. It's done in a very public, overly complex process that none of the participants seem to fully understand, but that lets everyone know where you stand politically.

Voting for a candidate in the New Hampshire primaries is done by ballot--ironically, a process that has a lot in common with the way Republican politicians like their sex. It's done secretly, in a booth, where your neighbors might be creeped out if they knew who you were really punching a hole in.

The White House still refuses to come clean on the question of when George W. Bush first knew about the morphing intel on Iran’s supposed nuclear weapons program.

Officials have now admitted that he was informed last August that the intelligence assessment of the Iranians’ activity in this regard was changing. But, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Mr. Bush knew all about the [skeptical] intel that led to the recently revised assessment, early last spring.

To me, this is just more proof that, given the choice between telling the truth and lying about something of genuine interest to the public in general -- even if it's life or death information -- the Bush regime picks the proverbial low road without fail. Moreover, they lie about something/anything not just to cover that particular something up; they lie indiscriminately and pervasively, in advance of, during the process of, and/or after the fact about anything that can conceivably hurt or challenge the regime in any way, shape or form.